Thanks for the detailed reply. I am doing a pool with them now in NJ. I am still reserving judgment until I finish the whole process but so far I am frustrated with the rate progress. I had heard and read so many stories about how work is slow and delayed that I really grilled them on this. The sales/design guy said delays between phases of work were a "thing of the past" and that they build so many fewer pools now that it is a "non-issue." I even specifically said since the work will be done in spring when it rains a lot, I know we will have rain days but wanted to know if rain days led to getting re-scheduled to the back of the list and caused a lot of dry day delays. Again, "oh no, definitely not. Nothing like that." Bottom line he said even with typical rain delays I should get from dig to swimming in 8 weeks. Before the dig it could take "up to a month" if the Township holds up the permits� I signed in early March. They dug the hole 31 days later. The Township approved the permit within one working day of receiving it, except for the part A&S forgot to file (new employee I am told � I only found this out because I have a contact in the Township). A&S then took a week to file that part and then just mailed it. Township turned it over almost immediately again. But it took a couple weeks to get the dig scheduled. The hole was dug two weeks ago and counting. That�s where it stands. They did have the steel crew come out about a week later but some of the dirt had slid back into the site so they left and said the diggers had to return. They finally did and it took them and hour in-and-out and they were done very early that morning. Still no sign of the steel crew and from communicating with the scheduler it is definitely the case that I am at the back of a list again, despite being told it didn�t work that way. Of course if they wait long enough it will rain again and more dirt will slide back into the hole and we�ll just have to do this song and dance again. In the best case scenario now it will have been 19 days between the first day of actual work (which took half-a-day) and the next (which will likely take only half a day too). The bottom line is I understand rain delays but I have had more dry day delays than rain so far, and that goes directly against my asked-and-answered questions about how the process would work. BTW, to your other comments, at least where I am they seem to mostly use Jandy equipment. I wish they used Pentair because I wanted to use their control system that had the iPhone/iPad interface. They said they could only install the Jandy PDA system and wouldn�t even quote the Pentair. They use AquaCal for heat pumps, which they strongly pushed as the preferred heating method, and Raypak for propane heaters, Haward for LED lighting and Polaris for sweeps. And they strongly push the Nature2 Fusion system over doing a saltwater chlorinator. They reluctantly quoted a saltwater chlorinator after some prodding but it was ridiculously more expensive that just getting one installed after the fact and they offered zero credit to remove the Fusion system if you did it and were going to force me to sign something that basically indemnified them against any premature damage to the coping or the stone on the raised bond beam. They do use Jason�s as their servicing company. I don�t know if they do the plumbing too since I haven�t gone to that yet. They use Corbin for the electrical.

No salt for 30 days for sure with any new cement based interior surface. The heating is actually more of a concern for your heater since pH fluctuations will be crazy for the first month in a concrete pool. A pH of 6, as recommended by someone here, is 10 times more acidic than a pH of 7 and 100 times more acidic than a pH of 8. Since a heater is so expensive and the internals are quite sensitive to pH imbalance it would be in your best interest to have the heater bypassed until you have the pH controlled. If you do not have a heater bypass built in then you can not avoid sending water through the heater unfortunately. Water temp is one of the factors in calculating the saturation index of the pool water - which is to say the potential for a scaling state in the water. This is why you can not just use soft water to fill with - it needs to have calcium hardness high enough to not damage new concrete but also not develop a scaling state from high temps and too much calcium hardness. For the first 30 days simply watch your pH and alkalinity, as well as maintain around 1ppm free chlorine. If you heat it then don't boil it - 80 degrees. New pool owners tend to like 90 degrees until they get the first gas bill.

Repair Guy, Are you disagreeing topping off hard water with softwater as reposted below? I can see starting with softwater as bad and keeping the water hardness below 250 as bad, but isn't it okay to use soft water as fill to keep the hardness down? Thanks in advance for your expertise. * Posted by scrapula (My Page) on Thu, Jun 28, 07 at 6:21 Like cheifneil, we also filled with hard water which is what the Pebble Tec installers recommended. When the calcium hardness starts to get up to the higher end of normal, we run a hose to the spigot with soft water and fill from there. * Posted by chiefneil (My Page) on Wed, Jun 27, 07 at 20:08 I did my initial fill with hard water, but I keep it topped up with soft water. So long as the hardness stays above 250 I think you'll be fine. At least I'm not worried about it.

gk, I don't know where I got the idea you had an SWG. The best investment you could make in your pool right now would be a good quality test kit so that you don't have to rely on the pool store. There are pool stores that do water testing well but many more that don't and it can be hard to tell the difference. If you decide to get a test kit I recommend the Taylor K-2006 or the one available at http://www.tftestkits.com/. The TF Test kit is based on the Taylor kit but the reagent sizes are "right-sized" so it's a better value. As far as how much chlorine you need to add each week, you need to keep your free chlorine level between the min and max values on the Best Guess Chart (link below); it's a function of the amount of stabiliser (aka cyanuric acid aka CYA) in your water. The best way to do that is to test your free chlorine level frequently and add enough chlorine after each test to return your chlorine level to the desired range. Here's a really helpful chemical dosing calculator that will tell you how much of what to add to adjust your water chemistry: http://www.troublefreepool.com/viewtopic.php?t=1005&highlight=calculator. BleachCalc is another program that will do the same thing. You can find it here: http://www.troublefreepool.com/viewtopic.php?t=110. You only need to shock if your combined chlorine level is above 0.5 ppm. If you're diligent about testing your water and keeping a sufficient chlorine residual in it you should rarely have to shock. Some people just shock weekly as insurance; that's fine but unecessary if you stay on top of things. The pool store chlorinating liquid at 10.5% or 12% sodium hypoochlorite can be a better value than regular bleach. They're just different strengths. Some pool stores will also sell chlorine in 5 gallon carboys and that can be very cost effective. You shouldn't add bleach to the skimmer of a pool with an inline chlorinator because the tri-chlor in the skimmer, even just some residue, can react with the bleach and cause an explosion. Here is a link that might be useful: Best Guess Chart